517th TRG welcomes new commander

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Joshua Edwards
  • 17th Training Wing Public Affairs
PRESIDIO OF MONTEREY, California --  Col. Kimberlee P. Joos, 17th Training Wing Commander, presided over the 517th Training Group's change of command ceremony on Soldier Field June 26.

The 517th TRG is located within the Defense Language Institute at the Presidio of Monterey, California, and consists of two training squadrons dedicated to training future cryptologic linguist.

"The 517th Training Group is an amazing collection of some of the most professional, passionate and gifted people who call themselves Airmen," said Col. Joos. "It is a group of roughly 120 permanent party personnel, who are charged with three main things: training members of the armed services to master complex foreign languages in seemingly records amount of time, developing roughly 1,300 Airmen at any given time who've joined the United States Air Force and come to the Presidio of Monterey to learn one of those complex languages, teaching them our core values, ethics, character and the profession of arms, and perhaps most importantly inspiring these Airmen to use what they have learned to protect the national security of the United States of America."

During the change of command, Col. Ginger L. Wallace said her farewell as the outgoing commander.

"I first want to recognize the 517th Training Group, the finest training group in the Air Force," she said. "I thank them for not only standing in formation today, but for being an inspiration to me every day for the last two years. I'm very grateful I had the opportunity to lead you."

Col. Keith M. Logeman, who took command of the 517th TRG during the ceremony, laid out his priorities.

"My initial goals fall into three categories: mission, Airmen and families," said Logeman. "From a mission perspective, my goal is to continuously improve the exceptional programs my predecessor Col. Wallace put in place. My second goal is for the Airmen. I plan to put a lot of focus into our Airmanship programs to ensure that the Airmen who graduate from DLI are disciplined, they're fit and are able to support the combatant commanders this nation needs them to. The third goal would fit into the family category. Many of our Airmen come here with families and to be able to take care of those families in proper ways so that our Airmen can concentrate on the very rigorous academic work load.”

Before taking command of the 517th TRG, Logeman was the Curtis E. LeMay Center for Doctrine Development and Education Director of Intelligence at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama.